


i'm serious about the pomegranates

by wiltedviolets



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-20
Updated: 2014-02-20
Packaged: 2018-01-13 04:11:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1212223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wiltedviolets/pseuds/wiltedviolets
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jason Grace, age eighteen, former high school soccer star and valedictorian, isn’t quite sure what to make of his new dorm mate.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i'm serious about the pomegranates

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BadgerInMySoup](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BadgerInMySoup/gifts).



>  

Jason Grace, age eighteen, former high school soccer star and valedictorian, isn’t quite sure what to make of his new dorm mate.  Especially since he hasn’t technically met him yet.

It’s been nearly a week now, and all Jason knows about his roommate is that he’s a freshman, he likes Mythomagic, and everything he owns is black.  Oh, and his name is Nico di Angelo, but Jason only knows _that_ because it’s on the door.

He doesn’t seem to get in until Jason’s already asleep, and he doesn’t wake up until after Jason has already left for his morning breakfast dates with Piper.  He doesn’t even know what Nico looks like — the guy sleeps rolled up in his blankets like a burrito, with nothing but a few tufts of dark hair sticking out.

“Nico di Angelo,” Jason says.  “That sounds Italian, right?  Do you think he’s a transfer student?”

“Maybe he just likes his privacy,” Piper suggests, before draining the last of her hazelnut latte.

“It’s been five days, Piper,” he says.  “Five days, and I wouldn’t recognize him if he was standing right in front of me.”  His coffee sits untouched in front of them, and Piper rolls her eyes affectionately.

Piper kisses him goodbye and heads for her first class, then calls back, “By the way, his sister’s in my art class!”

* * *

It’s been one week exactly.  Jason has learned that Nico’s sister is named Hazel, that she’s either his stepsister or half-sister (he’s not sure), that she likes art and horses, has a boyfriend named Frank, and that her mom was from New Orleans.  All he’s learned about Nico is that sometimes he plays Mythomagic with Hazel’s boyfriend.

“Piper thinks I’m being ridiculous,” Jason says.

“No, dude, you’re right.”  Leo sits on Nico’s bed — it’s only eight o’clock, and Nico’s never back before eleven — and flips through his book of Mythomagic cards.  Jason should probably tell him to leave Nico’s stuff alone, but Jason’s curious, and it’s not like he’s the one snooping.  “It’s totally creepy — he sleeps in your room and you don’t know anything about him.  He could be a serial killer or a — whoa, he has a mint condition Achilles & Patroclus card, do you realize how much this is worth? They don’t even _make_ these anymore.”

Jason snatches the binder from Leo and puts it back under Nico’s bed where it belongs.

* * *

It’s week two, and Thalia brings over a Good Luck at College cookie cake and a box of frozen burritos.  He cuts a fourth of the cake off and covers it in plastic wrap, then puts a sticky note on it that says ‘ _for nico :) - j_ .’

When he gets up in the morning, Nico is rolled up in his blankets.  And on the whiteboard above the mini fridge — he almost misses it — it just says ‘ _Thanks_.’

Beneath Nico’s message, Jason scrawls, ‘ _help yourself to the burritos. I don’t like the ones with beans_.’

Piper laughs at him over breakfast.  Leo says that he shouldn’t be giving perfectly good food to his creepy roommate when he could be giving it to Leo.

“You don’t even like bean burritos,” Jason counters.

“Dude, that’s so not the point!”

* * *

On week five, Nico doesn’t come to the room at all on Thursday night.  He’s not there when Jason leaves, and the bed is still the same rumpled mess it was the night before.  Nico’s history book is still on the floor next to his Mythomagic binder, and Jason knows — not that he’s keeping track — that history is Nico’s first class on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Jason’s last whiteboard message, telling him that his stepmother brought him a box of pomegranates, is unanswered, and Nico’s never left a message without a succinct little ‘Thanks’ in reply.

Jason doesn’t have to be a genius to figure out why Nico would be out all night.

Underneath his last message, Jason writes, ‘ _have a good time last night?_ ’  Then — after some debate — draws a winking smiley face next to it.

When he comes back in the afternoon to grab his soccer gear, Nico’s chemistry book is gone.  Both of Jason’s messages have been replaced by Nico’s: _‘None of your business._ ’  Then, smaller, underneath, ‘ _Help yourself to the pomegranates.  I don’t even like the stupid things._ ’

Jason laughs, then replies, ‘ _I’m not hearing a no._ ’

In the morning, the board says, _‘Go to hell.  I’m serious about the pomegranates._ ’

For breakfast, Jason splits a pomegranate with a bemused Piper.

“He told you to go to hell?” she asks, eyes wide.

“I guess it’s funnier in context.”

* * *

On Monday of week six, Jason opens the door to a dark-haired stranger rummaging around through Nico’s things.  He spends about fifteen seconds standing awkwardly in the doorway, trying to figure out if he should call campus security or if said stranger is Nico, when the stranger turns around and beams at him.

“Hey!  You must be Jason,” he says.  “Have you seen Nico’s calculator?”

“Uh, do we know each other?” Jason asks, because he’s not sure what the protocol is for this.

“Oh, sorry.”  He drops the pile of dirty clothes he was looking under an extends one hand to Jason.  “Percy Jackson.  I’m Nico’s—”

“You’re the swim team captain!” Jason blurts, and Percy’s eyes light up.

“Captain of the best swim team in the Northeast division two years running,” Percy announces.  “You’re the new soccer star, right?  I heard your high school was undefeated.”

“Yeah, I—”

“Oh, crap, calculator!”  Percy drops to his knees and starts digging under the bed.  “I can’t find it.  I’m pretty sure he left it—”  He meets Jason’s eyes briefly, then quickly looks away.  “Uh, nevermind.”  His face is red.  “Any chance you have a graphing calculator Nico could borrow?  I’d let him borrow mine, but mine’s at home and I commute, so—”

“Yeah, sure.”  Jason digs the calculator out of his bag and hands it to Percy.

“Thanks, dude!” Percy calls, before darting off like a bat out of hell.

Jason erases Nico’s last message off the the whiteboard and writes, ‘ _your boyfriend seems cool.  put the calculator wherever when you’re done with it._ ’

When he leaves for breakfast with Piper in the morning, the whiteboard says ‘ _Thanks._ ’  Jason smiles.

* * *

On the next Wednesday, two days after meeting Nico’s boyfriend, Jason opens the door to his dorm room to see Nico sitting on his bed.  His laptop is open, and his ears are covered — almost comically — with oversized headphones.  Their eyes meet briefly, and Jason smiles.  Nico nods, then looks back down at his computer screen.  Jason can hear the sound of something like gunfire and lasers from Nico’s headphones.

Jason takes out a book and tries to read, but keeps looking up every few minutes to make sure Nico is actually there.

At one point Nico catches him and scowls.   “What?”

Jason, panicking, says the first thing that comes to his mind.  “Are there any more pomegranates?”

Nico looks at him like he’s grown a second head.  “Tons.  Like I said, help yourself.”

Jason breaks open a pomegranate and eats most of it, even though he’s not really hungry, and makes a point of not staring at his roommate for the rest of the night.

* * *

After that, Nico starts coming in a few hours before Jason goes to bed.  They still don’t talk much, except through the whiteboard, and mostly about food, but at least it’s starting to feel like he has an actual person for a roommate and not a ghost.

“I’m gonna order a pizza,” Jason announces.  He waves his phone in the air and points at it.

Nico doesn’t so much as blink.  Jason can hear screams coming from Nico’s headphones as Nico frantically mashes on his keyboard.

“I said,” Jason repeats, raising his voice, “I’m gonna order a pizza.  Do you—”

“Heard you the first time!” Nico shouts, and Jason kind of wants to remind him that he’s not the one wearing headphones.  “Just one second, I’m kind of — son of a — I’m in the middle of something!”

Jason waits about two minutes, then sighs.  “I’m calling Dominos.  Is pepperoni okay you?”

Nico rips off the headphones and shoves the laptop away.  “Oh my god, no, give me the phone.  You live in New York City, you’re getting a real pizza.”

“Oh, sure, thathe hears.”  Jason hands Nico his phone to Nico, who snatches it with the sort of speed and determination more appropriate for taking weapons away from small children than for ordering pizza.

“Dominos,” Nico sighs.  “Seriously, what is this, the dark ages?”

* * *

On week eight, Nico comes back at nine o’clock.  He pulls out his laptop, like every night, but doesn’t put on his headphones.  Jason figures that’s the closest thing to an invitation he’s going to get.

“So,” Jason starts, “Uh.”  He has a hundred questions he wants to ask.  He feels like he knows nothing about Nico.  “How long have you and Percy been dating?”

Nico’s fingers freeze on the keyboard, and Jason gets the impression it was the wrong thing to ask.

“I mean, if you’re not comfortable, that’s—”

“Since summer,” Nico says, simply, without taking his eyes away from the screen.  He starts typing again.

“Oh, cool.”  Jason hesitates and turns to face Nico.  “Where did you guys meet?”

Nico stops and looks up at Jason.  He’s frowning.  “Why do you want to know?”

“‘Cause you’re my roommate.”  Jason shrugs.  “And — I dunno — I guess I was kind of hoping we could be friends?”

Nico looks wary, and Jason wonders if the idea of someone wanting to be friends with him is really so foreign to him.  A part of him kind of wants to give Nico a hug, but he’s pretty sure that wouldn’t go over well.

Nico is quiet for a few minutes, and Jason is starting to think Nico’s not going to answer.  “We went to the same high school.”

“Oh,” Jason says, brightly.  “So you guys were friends?”

“No.”  Nico puts on his headphones and turns away.

Jason has a thousand more questions.

It’s progress.

* * *

It’s week nine, and there’s a picture on the nightstand next to Nico’s bed.  It’s been there since they moved in, but Jason’s never really noticed it before.  Nico doesn’t seem big on pictures, and this one doesn’t look all that special at first glance.  It’s an old, yellowed polaroid — a  _polaroid_ , and Jason hasn’t seen one of those since he was a kid — of a boy and a girl, standing in front of a woman.

The boy can’t be more than ten or eleven, and with his messy black hair and dark eyes, he’s unmistakably Nico.  The only difference is that he’s smiling, and Jason’s never seen Nico smile.

The girl with him is smiling too, and so is the woman.  Both have Nico’s dark hair and olive skin.  The girl looks like she might be in high school.  Jason wonders if this is Nico’s family.  He’s never heard Hazel mention another sister.

He doesn’t hear Nico come in.

“Her name was Bianca,” Nico says, from behind him.  Jason expects him to sound irritated, but he mostly sounds sad.

“Was?”

“She died in a car crash when I was eleven.  So did my mother.”  Nico sits down on the edge of his bed and gently takes the picture from Jason.  “We got hit by a drunk driver.”

“I’m sorry.”  It sounds hollow, even to him.  He can’t imagine what that must be like.  He can’t imagine not having Thalia.

“Thanks,” Nico says, and it sounds like he means it.

Jason hesitates, then sits on the bed beside Nico.  “What was she like?  Your sister?”

“She was perfect.”

* * *

It’s Friday of week ten, and Nico is supposed to be gone all night on a date with Percy.  Instead, when Jason opens the door to his room, he sees Nico sitting in the floor in front of his bed and staring at a spot on the floor with enough intensity that Jason’s afraid it might catch fire.

“What happened to your date?” Jason asks.  He slings his backpack onto the bed before kicking off his shows.

Nico’s hands curl into fists on his knees.  “He bailed.  Apparently something important for swim team came up last minute.”

“Do you wanna talk—”

“No,” Nico interrupts, “I don’t.”

Jason shuffles awkwardly from foot to foot and stares down at Nico.  “So, what, are you just going to sit there and sulk all night?”

“I was planning on it, but I can see you’re going to make that difficult.”  Nico glares up at him.  And he probably thinks he’s intimidating, but he mostly just reminds Jason of a housecat pretending to be a lion.

“No,” Jason says.

“No what?”

“No, you’re not sulking.”

“Don’t you have something better to do?”  Nico hauls himself up onto the bed and face-plants into his pillow.  “Soccer to play, merit badges to earn, little old ladies to help across the street?”

Jason finds a dried pomegranate seed and flicks it at Nico’s head.  Nico chucks a book back.

An hour later, Jason manages to drag Nico out of the room for dessert, then very nearly abandons him when Nico insists on going to the commissary.

“You’ll make me order pizza from some snooty Italian place because you don’t like Dominos but you’ll eat crusty three day old brownies?”

“Fine,” Nico sighs.  “If it’s that big of a deal, we can go to your stupid bakery.”

Jason lectures Nico on proper ratio of cake to frosting in a proper cupcake, and insists that brownies should always be served warm with a side of vanilla ice cream.  Nico lists all the reasons pomegranates are not a suitable dessert in between bites of his devil’s food cake.

By the end of the night, Nico seems — well, not happy, of course.  Jason’s never seen Nico actually happy.  But he’s content.

He doesn’t speak about Percy anymore that night, and Jason doesn’t push it.

* * *

On Monday, Jason finds himself in line behind Percy in the athlete’s cafeteria.  He thinks about talking to Percy about Nico, but decides to leave it between the two of them, since he doesn’t know the story and for all he knows the two of them have already worked it out.  Besides, Nico would probably kill him for meddling.

Then, just as Jason is about to ask Percy to pass him a pudding cup, Percy blurts, “Do you know why Nico’s angry with me?”

“Uh.”  Jason avoids Percy’s eyes as he reaches past Percy for his vanilla pudding.  “What makes you think he’s angry with you?”

“He’s kind of been avoiding me.”  Percy frowns.  “Also, this morning, Annabeth came up to me and said, ‘Just so you know, Percy, Nico’s angry with you.’”

“Who’s Annabeth?”

“You’re avoiding the question,” Percy points out.  “Which I’m guessing means you know something.”

Jason rubs the back of his head and sighs.  He hates being caught between people when they’re fighting.  “Look, did you cancel on Nico the other day for swim team stuff?”

“Not really?”  Percy looks confused for a moment.  “I mean, we usually do a movie night at my house on Fridays and get pizza, but it’s not like it was a date date or anything.  We have a big event coming up soon and the coach scheduled a few extra practices for the next couple of weeks.  Nico said it was fine.”

Jason starts to say something else, then gets shoulder-checked by one of the girls on the rugby team.  “Will you losers get out of the way?” she snaps.  “You’re backing up the line.”

Percy winces.  “Sorry, Clarisse.”

“Let’s go.”  Jason grabs Percy by the sleeve and tugs him to the nearest table.

“So Nico’s mad I missed movie night for swim team?”

“No,” Jason says.  “He’s mad because he thought you didn’t care.”

* * *

That Thursday, Jason and Piper have a double date with Leo and his new girlfriend.  He’s never met her, but he knows she goes to some prestigious art college and lives in a fancy loft on the Upper West Side.  She’s also really hot, according to Leo.

Jason’s had it written on the whiteboard since Tuesday.  Nico writes back, ‘ _I still don’t think she’s real._ ’

They’re supposed to be going to some fancy restaurant — one of those jacket-and-tie things, according to Leo — Jason realizes halfway through to the restaurant he accidentally put on his tennis shoes instead of dress shoes, so they have to go back, which means they’re going to be late.

Jason races up the stairs to his dorm, and in his haste, he forgets to knock.  Nico’s never back this early anyway.

Except, it seems, for today.

He doesn’t see much before Nico starts yelling and throwing things at him.  Jason retreats and slams the door behind him, but not before getting a much better view of Percy Jackson’s dick than he ever wanted to see.

“Uh, guys, can I please have my shoes?” Jason calls.

“Go to hell,” Nico says.  It sounds like he’s right on the other side of the door.

“If you don’t give me my shoes I can’t go away.”

Nico grumbles something that Jason can’t understand before opening the door just wide enough for Jason to see him.  Nico, thankfully, is still wearing is pants.  “Take you goddamn shoes,” Nico says, shoving them through the door.

“So does this mean you guys have made up now, or—”

Nico slams the door in his face.

When Jason stumbles into the car, trying to hop on one foot while shoving the other into his shoe, Piper’s eyebrows shoot up.

“What happened?” she asks.

“I officially know what Nico’s boyfriend’s dick looks like,” Jason says, focusing intently on his shoes and definitely not the image seared into his retinas.

“Kinky,” Piper teases.  “So what’s the verdict?”

“Oh my god, Piper.”  Jason sinks down into the seat and covers his face with his arm.  “No.  No, we’re not talking about it.”

Piper, the traitor, tells Leo, who spends the entire night suggesting phallic-shaped foods to Jason, and Leo’s girlfriend — who is very real — thinks it’s hilarious.

Jason sneaks into the room after Nico is already asleep.  He tries not to bang into anything in the dark, and sloppily writes the word ‘Sorry’ on the whiteboard.

* * *

“Just so you know, I hate you,” Nico says, when Jason comes in from soccer practice.  Nico is sitting crosslegged on his bed, reading a book.  He’s scowling, but Nico is pretty much always scowling.

“But you and Percy made up, right?” Jason asks hopefully,

“Seriously, you couldn’t even knock?”

“I’m just happy to see you two are getting along again,” Jason continues, without so much as acknowledging Nico.

“You’re the worst roommate ever.”

“I just hope you guys used protection—”

“Go to hell, Jason.”

Jason laughs.

That night they order a pizza from one of Nico’s pretentious Italian pizzerias.  For dessert, Jason breaks open the first pomegranate from Nico’s stepmother’s latest batch.  Nico eats half of it without so much as a complaint, and Jason grins.

“I thought you didn’t like pomegranates.”

Nico shrugs and says, “I guess they’re growing on me.”

**Author's Note:**

> For [Kim](http://actualwizardbillykaplan666.tumblr.com)'s birthday. This is unbeta'd. Any mistakes are mine alone.


End file.
